Thanks, I think antipathy effects towards the name “Effective Altruism”, or worse, “I’m an effective altruist”, are difficult to overstate.
Also, somewhat related to what you write I happen to have thought to myself just today: “I (and most of us are) am just as much an effective egoist as an effective altruist”, after all even the holiest of us probably cannot always help ourselves putting a significantly higher weight on our own welfare than on those of average strangers.
Nevertheless, some potential upside of the current term – equally I’m not sure it matters much at all, but I attribute a small chance to them being really important: If some people are kept away by the name’s bit geeky/partly unfashionable connotation, maybe these are exactly the people that would anyways be mostly distractors. I think the bit narrow EA community has this extraordinary vibe along a few really important dimensions, and it seems invaluable (in that sense while RyanCarey mentions we may not attract the core audience with different names, I find the problem might be more another way round, we might simply dilute the core).
Maybe I’m completely overestimating this, and maybe it’s not outweighing at all the downside of attracting/appealing to fewer. But in a world where the lack of fruitful communication threatens entire social systems, maybe having a particularly strong core in that regard is highly valuable.
Agree that selection effects can be desirable and that dilution effects may matter if we choose a name that is too likable. But if we hold likability fixed, and switch to a name that is more appropriate (i.e. more descriptive), then it should select people more apt for the movement, leading to a stronger core.
Thanks, I think antipathy effects towards the name “Effective Altruism”, or worse, “I’m an effective altruist”, are difficult to overstate.
Also, somewhat related to what you write I happen to have thought to myself just today: “I (and most of us are) am just as much an effective egoist as an effective altruist”, after all even the holiest of us probably cannot always help ourselves putting a significantly higher weight on our own welfare than on those of average strangers.
Nevertheless, some potential upside of the current term – equally I’m not sure it matters much at all, but I attribute a small chance to them being really important: If some people are kept away by the name’s bit geeky/partly unfashionable connotation, maybe these are exactly the people that would anyways be mostly distractors. I think the bit narrow EA community has this extraordinary vibe along a few really important dimensions, and it seems invaluable (in that sense while RyanCarey mentions we may not attract the core audience with different names, I find the problem might be more another way round, we might simply dilute the core).
Maybe I’m completely overestimating this, and maybe it’s not outweighing at all the downside of attracting/appealing to fewer. But in a world where the lack of fruitful communication threatens entire social systems, maybe having a particularly strong core in that regard is highly valuable.
Agree that selection effects can be desirable and that dilution effects may matter if we choose a name that is too likable. But if we hold likability fixed, and switch to a name that is more appropriate (i.e. more descriptive), then it should select people more apt for the movement, leading to a stronger core.
Strongly agree. The potential benefits of selection effects are underrated in these discussions.